One factor that suggests you can describe the war as a success is the role of William Pitt. His role is described perfectly by Karl W. Schweizer, who is a professor and chair of the Department of Humanities and social sciences at New Jersey Institute, in his book War, Politics and Diplomacy which states ‘For the longest time historians studying civil-military relations during the Seven Year Wars have inevitably linked Britain’s ultimate victory with Pitt’s strategic mastery, supreme direction of the war effort, predominance over vital government departments and above all, with his “wise choice of commanders on land and sea’. This gives a great overview to why he was such an asset to Britain during this war time period. Pitt refused to work under the ineffective Newcastle who is most renowned for his ‘sarcastic tirade: “Annapolis, Annapolis! oh! yes, Annapolis must be defended; to be sure Annapolis should be defended—where is Annapolis?” The story illustrated the patronising disdain for provincials that remained a part of metropolitan political culture, but it also demonstrated Newcastle’s out-of-date and out-of-touch attitude towards the importance of empire.’ The role of Pitt completely turned the war on its head. From fighting a losing battle against an enemy who knew the land better to overpowering them with more troops then they could deal with. Pitt is considered by many historians the original imperialist in modern England, this is due to how much Britain expanded under his power. Sarsons describes Pitts influence as ‘finally putting serious quantities of money and men behind the war effort, and there was little the French could do. With too few habitants and with Indian allies who were unwilling to take on the British in set-piece battles, they suffered serious losses from the second half of 1758. Over the next year the British advanced northwards, capturing all of Quebec by September 1759 except Montreal, which finally fell on 8 September 1760, followed by Detroit on 29 November.’ One of Pitt’s tactics that Pitt employed in order to achieve anything in the Seven Year war was offer Frederick II subsidy each year of almost £800,000 and also gives him support by taking away his role in the defence of Western Germany from the French. This is where is believed Pitt boasted of his fine achievement by claiming he had ‘won Canada on the banks of the Rhine. The reason Frederick took such a subsidy is explained in Daniel Marston’s book The Seven Years War, in which he states that Frederick II could recognise ‘the formidable possibility of an Anglo-Austrian-Russian alliance against him, made overtures to the British government in May 1955, indicating he had no designs on Hanover and wished for peace.’.
A notion which offers a problem for the British in the French and Indian war is the advantage the French had at the start of the war due to their Native American allies. The Native Americans had far superior geographical understanding of the battle field in this period and this led to early defeats as George Washington was defeated at Fort Necessity. This was because the military led by Washington was no match for the French ’troupe de la marine’ and General Edward Braddock was killed in Battle of the Wilderness for the British. In this battle the British clearly outnumbered the French but still managed to lose this battle. This turned out to be an important turning point in the War, because the British needed to review their tactics because at this time they were struggling to achieve anything. Daniel Marston suggests that the war was ‘fought in the forests, open plains and forts of the North American frontier. The French army, supported by allied Indian tribes and local colonial forces, initially benefited from a superior understanding of how to operate in the forests of North America although throughout the conflict it was numerically inferior to the British army.’
Another important point that must not be overlooked is how important the land which had been acquired was to the British were considered to be. Pitt decided the War needed better investment as before he agreed to this the French had control of the war. This was mostly down to the factor of colonial militiamen who were ineffective as soldiers due to their ill-discipline and they were known to flee battles. There is a quote from famous French writer Voltaire who suggests there battle for Canada is a thankless task by stating ‘two nations are at war for a few acres of snow in Canada, and that they spend over this beautiful war much more than Canada is worth’ This is of course dismissed by Nester in his book The First Global War who goes on to explain that Canada can be much more accurately considered a ‘vast land spanning half a continent’ that ‘harboured a potential wealth that far exceeded the cost of the wars fought over its fate’. Although what Nester suggests is true the war was financially draining, the cost of war was believed to reaching an average of almost fourteen million per year. This led to national debt almost doubling by 1763. The importance of taking control of Canada was really shown in 1757 when Pitt came to power as he provided 60,000 troops and also added more than 12,000 more to this before the end of the war. It is also believed that Pitt spent almost three million pounds on equipment for the troops.
There were many internal issues that needed to resolved quickly in order to have any chance of winning the French-Indian war one of which was the problem that ‘British commanders also resented local citizens who resisted the requisitioning of supplies and the billeting of soldiers, and British officers often could do little against them because local authorities tended to sympathise with them.’
When looking into Why Britain won the French and Indian War one of the aspects that cannot be overlooked is the laws that were passed by the British government in order to try and deal with debt. A prime example of this is the paper money laws that were set up that were an attempt at creating currencies and they are described by Steve Sarson as having a usual tendency to ‘depreciate in value’. This meant that the lenders, who were American, prospered whilst the creditors who were the British had to consider this a very costly exercise. Another problem that was proving extremely costly for the British Government was with the colonies not abiding by laws set out in the Navigation acts that were considered to be costing the British treasury around £700,000 towards the end of the battle against France.
The battles themselves can be segregated into different sections: The battle at sea was between the French and the British mainly. All colonial battles in the Caribbean and North American battles were also a French-British affair. It is clear why Britain won the naval war because according to Marston ‘the Royal navy had a tonnage of 277,000 in 1755 and 375,000 tons in 1760. The French navy had had 162,000 tons in 1755 and 156,000 tons in 1760.’ This shows that within the navy, as they did on land the British outnumbered the French severely. This was probably the key tactic during the French and Indian War, strength in numbers. France started the war extremely promisingly but when Pitt invested serious amounts of money in militia, the war had a different outlook. However, there were scares within the British camp that the Spanish could join allegiance with the French and therefore would severely outnumber the British, luckily the Spanish did not enter the war until ‘62 by which time Britain had overcome the French navy.
To say that Britain’s victory did not come at a price would be a bold statement, of all the countries that entered they were clearly the most successful but a severe economic costs that unbeknown to the British would be even more costly due to the American Revolution which took place just twelve years later. The Revolution which the British would lose. It is clear that no matter how well they performed in the French and Indian War it cost them dearly in the long term Marston describes this as Britain’s successes were short lived because ‘the war’s cost were to have a more lasting impact than its victories. The army had performed well, but many lessons learned were quickly forgotten, as was apparent when the British army went to war with America in 1775’
In conclusion it is clear that Britain were the Victors in the French and Indian War. However this victory came at a dear cost and that was the American Revolution which occurred just twelve years later and meant that Britain and its colonies did not have time to recover on a military and economical front. There was however some benefits for example the tactics employed by William Pitt meant that it was only called the Seven Year War rather than the Thirty or even Hundred year wars of yesteryear. The key reasons for the victory along with the tactics employed by Pitt were that they had a very strong financial backing from the British Government that meant that they out-matched their opponents by sheer numbers. According to most books researched the French and Indian war that led to the Seven Year war was overly expensive war that the land of Canada could have covered the cost of in the long term but the financial strains brought on by the war proved detrimental in their long term goals.
Bibliography
Marston, D: The Seven Year War, Osprey Publishing 2001
Sarson, S: Lecture 21 09/12/08
Marston, D: The French-Indian War 1754-1760, Osprey publishing 2002
Nester, W.R: The First Global War, Greenwood Publishing 2000
Richard White, The Middle Ground: Indians, Empires, and Republics in the Great Lakes Region, 1650-1815 (Cambridge, 1991)
Richard Middleton, The Bells of Victory: The Pitt-Newcastle Ministry and the Conduct of the Seven Years’ War, 1757-1762 (Cambridge, 1985)
Jane T. Merritt, At the Crossroads: Indians and Empires on a Mid-Atlantic Frontier, 1700-1763 (Chapel Hill, 2003)
Alan Rogers, Empire and Liberty: American Resistance to British Authority, 1755-1763 (Berkeley, 1973)
Marston, D: The Seven Year War, Osprey Publishing 2001, pg 7
Sarson, S: Lecture 21 09/12/08
Schweizer, K.W: War, Politics and Diplomacy, New York: Garland, 1991, pg 27
Sarson, S: Lecture 21 09/12/08
Marston, D: The Seven Year War, Osprey Publishing 2001, pg 15
Marston, D: The French-Indian War 1754-1760, Osprey publishing 2002, pg 8
Nester, W.R: The First Global War, Greenwood Publishing 2000, pg 1
Sarson, S: Lecture 21 09/12/08
Marston, D: The Seven Year War, Osprey Publishing 2001, pg 29